Bias to clarity

I am starting a new experiment today that I am referring to as “mini-musings”. Mini-musings will be periodic, short-form posts on topics that have caught my imagination recently, and may spark inspiration for you too. These will be in addition to my monthly, long-form essays that explore specific, deeper themes. I hope you enjoy both! 💚

Every action that you take comes with potential costs and potential benefits. Similarly, inaction also comes with potential costs and potential benefits (though the latter can be less obvious). In product work, we need to choose when to act and when to hold off - and calculate the real cost <> benefit tradeoff.

Often, when you are seeking out new information or data, the best thing to do is to act, and act fast. Other times, when you are drowning in information and data, you need more time and space to sift through it all. In those cases, what you are lacking is clarity - not data. While the work to get to clarity is active work, it can sometimes look or feel like inaction to you or others.

“Bias-to-action” is popular because it reinforces that we must act to learn and to receive feedback from the outer world. It also reminds us that analysis-paralysis or passive inaction (ex: procrastination) is costly. But bias-to-action can be problematic too, if it presumes a narrow definition of what acting means (ex: writing code), or doesn’t account for the work needed to go from drowning in information & data, to basking in clarity.

I prefer “bias-to-clarity”. Clarity is the real prize we earn through both our periods of action, and our periods of (perceived) inaction. If you bias to clarity, you’ll pick the best path to get there, and get there faster.

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